Consulting Services

As a professional urban designer and partner of the Planning and Design Firm Space Between Design Studio, I am a trained urbanist who specializes in creating walkable urban developments and analyzing existing places to find the barriers preventing livable, walkable urbanism. I can be reached at patrick [at] spacebtw.com

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Two things, first a poll on CNN, asking how many Americans could get by without a car. Apparently, I say apparently because the poll has changed, but I've been told the results are 17% Yes. I'm shocked they are that high. The fact of the matter is our entire built environment outside of a few places (albeit highly populated places, NYC, DC, Portland, etc.) is predicated on car ownership and auto-oriented development.

Second, is this related article about Mayors requesting financial help for crumbling infrastructure. I've been to too many cities where they have been so sparsely built that there literally is not the tax base to support the amount of roads and subterranean infrastructure to pay to even maintain it, let alone upgrade it to sufficient standards. Ironic that the most "liberal" in terms of land development allowed are the most "conservative" politically, yet these "conservative" communities often have the highest tax rates to support their unsustainable development patterns.

Don't build more densely because I say so, support dense development because it is all we can afford.

Walkably Quotable

"The American love affair with the car...it's an awful lot like Stockholm Syndrome." ~ Me.In the Sixties the philosopher Ivan Illich showed that the amount of energy invested into cars and road infrastructure would be sufficient to cover the distance by foot - and in a considerably more beautiful and peaceful environment.

Search This Blog

Loading...

wibiya widget

In the Sixties, the philosopher Ivan Illich showedthat the amount of energy invested into cars and road infrastructure would be sufficient to cover the distance by foot - and in a considerably more beautiful and peaceful environment.